Yes, it's my interpretation of what I've been reading in how-to-write books. It seems fairly non-controversial, though. It must be important to make a connection (a bond) between MC and reader as early as possible. The reader has to care about the MC and what happens to him/her.
All that's required for the reader to bond to a character is for that character to appear. Readers are like baby ducks that way: they'll imprint on and follow the first moving object they see. That's why it's good for the first moving character the readers see to be the main character.
I have a number of examples from Maass's book. The Road, by Cormac McCarthy is one that I've actually got here.
The road is a dead-standard piece of post-apocalyptic science fiction. The difference between McCarthy's piece and any random Baen book in the same subgenre is if it were published by Baen they'd have cleaned up the punctuation and spelling, and it wouldn't have been reviewed in The New Yorker.
In the case of my own book, Chapter 1 used to start with dialogue: The MC is being questioned by a policeman, following the discovery of a body. I have now added 300 words that make a huge difference, as the dialogue has much more meaning, now that the MC had introduced himself.
We've just finished several threads on starting novels with dialog elsewhere in this forum (and I'm sure it'll come around again). The reason you should think carefully about starting a book with dialog is that it's very easy to do badly.
I think you are less than enamoured of how-to-write books (?) Time to publish your own, perhaps?
Yeah, someday. Meanwhile, read back through the couple-hundred pages of this thread.
I had a look for "Logical Chess" but it's not available in the library. I'm pretty sure I read it aeons ago. I'm not sure I really need it, anyhow, as I have played chess at competition levels and I have several other books on chess strategy, notably Point Count Chess by Horowitz et al., and Nimzowitsch's (rare and wonderful) My System. Am I right in assuming your direction to read Logical Chess is aimed at people who don't actually play the game (much)?
No, my direction to read Logical Chess is aimed at people who want to learn to write. In brief: It explains every move. The goal is to have a reason for everything you do. You need to put your pieces (and your pawns) in the places where they are most likely to do you some good later on, even if you don't know now what that good will be.
I can see several problems with the analogy: First, chess is a battle between two opposing minds. Each of my moves will be countered by my opponent and his move choices will influence mine. Where's the opposing mind in writing fiction?
The usual name for the opposing mind in writing fiction is "conflict." You, the author, are making it tough for your characters to reach their goal.
Second, a game of chess is not predetermined.
It totally is. Either white will win, or black will win, or there will be a draw.
None of the moves (apart from the first) can be written down beforehand except as conditionals (if he does this, then I'll do that). I have to have a detailed plot outline in place before I start to write. I can't write a book by making it up, one chapter at a time.
Oh really? And where exactly does that plot outline come from?
I have a great anecdote about Blackburne that's relevant here, but which I'll save for another time.
I can see I'm going to have to import a post from another thread and disassemble it here.
Third, in chess, you can't move any of your main pieces (characters) without first moving one of your minor ones. (The knights are exceptions, of course).
In chess the game doesn't start until something moves. In novels, the same.
Fourth, which of your chess pieces stands for your main character? The king? He hardly moves before the endgame. The queen? It is considered unwise to move her too early. The rooks are no good; They're hemmed in at the corners until the mid-game. So, we're left with the bishops and the knights. That's four equal characters...
None of them stand for your main character. Or, they're all main characters. If you were to ask the apothecary in Romeo and Juliette, "Who's the main character?" he'd say, "There's this apothecary, y'see....." (Next assignment: Watch
Shakespeare in Love.) The characters aren't the point of your novel anyway: The climax is the point. The moment when someone says "Checkmate!"
That is the point.
I suppose I'm missing the point as usual...
Perhaps. You're familiar with
Alice in Wonderland?
